Ogre of the Siskiyous
There is a small booklet on the shelves on the Humboldt County Collection in Humboldt State College, Arcata titled The Hermit of the Siskiyous. It was written by LW Musick and was published in 1896. There is an odd little story on pages 79-80 describing an encounter that someone named Mr. Jack Dover had with a bizarre humanoid creature. This tale has sometimes ended up regurgitated in the pages of books on Sasquatch, but I would argue that it depicts quite a different critter. 'The Thing was of Gigantic Size' A correspondent for the Del Norte Record wrote into said record from Happy Camp in Siskiyou County on January 2nd, 1886 to discuss his limited knowledge about legends of wildman-like creatures in the area. He claims not to have previously known about these legends until attention was brought to the stories, presumably by the Record, but he was able to recall when one of Happy Camp's most trustworthy citizens had told him an odd story about something that he had seen while he was hunting. He described it as being stood 150 yards away from him, and as picking berries and tender shoots from the nearby bushes. It was a humanoid creature, and was hairless except in areas that would be expected to be hirsute in normal humans (pubic regions and around the face - its beard was commented on specifically). Its head resembled that of a bulldog, and had short ears and long hair. It made shrill noises compared to a woman in great fear. He noted that he couldn't see the entity making any footprints, but this was due to the hardness of the soil beneath it. Mr. Dover was stunned by the presence of the creature, but found himself unable to shoot at it because it was so human. He aimed his firearm at the beast several times but always hesitated and ultimately decided that he couldn't do it. The article then goes on to mention that the area in which the critter was seen is between Marble Mountain and Happy Camp, and also alleges that others have seen the same entity - only differing in their accounts over the height of the thing, with some deciding that it was taller than Dover claimed. As can be gathered from Dover's account, the primate-like creature is apparently herbivorous - and the correspondent mentioned that he believed that the animal made its den during the winter in some caves in the Marble Mountains. According to the source, this was the first recorded incident of a Sasquatch-like entity being seen in Northern California. The source also briefly flails around with hairbrained excuses when trying to make this creature seem like a true Bigfoot, seeing as it was specifically stated to have very little hair on its body and a face like a bulldog. I think that this sort of creature might've instead served as the inspiration for some of the mythology about giants, which can be seen all across North America. Source [http://www.bigfootencounters.com/stories/hermit.htm Bigfoot Encounters - The Hermit of the Siskiyous: An 1886 Excerpt] Category:Case Files Category:Trolls & Ogres Category:Hairy Humanoids Category:California Category:Berry-Picking